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Review – Thor, Hope Summers – Marvel Legends, Hasbro

Today, I continue my review of Hasbro’s first wave of 2012 Marvel Legends with a look at Thor and Hope Summers. Once again, I’m doing more than one figure in a review to help me get through wave 1 quicker. Like before, I won’t skip on any details. So, what do I think of the new Thor and Hope Summer figures?

Keep reading to find out!

PACKAGING – I’ve already expressed me thoughts on the packaging with my Klaw, Constrictor, and Iron Man review, but I’ll sum those up again here. I love the new packaging. It’s very vibrant, and I love the comic book influences with the comic styled fonts, and the shading dots. The packaging is consistent throughout all of wave 1, so none of the packages disappoint. The personalized artwork in the upper left corner and on the back are very refreshing to see, but again I do with there was more of a bio for the characters than one sentence.PACKAGING SCORE: 4 / 5

SCULPT – THOR: Thor’s sculpt is exactly the same as the San Diego Comic-Con exclusive released last year. I never got that figure though, so to me he’s brand new. Thor’s sculpt is very detailed. The scaling of the armor on his arms and legs is very nice, and he has lots of fabric wrinkles and muscle toning on his legs, hands, and chest that show through his outfit. He has a strap sculpted across his chest that I’m assuming is supposed to be something from the comics that helps Thor keep his cape on? I’m not sure about that.

Thor’s head sculpt is great and continues the very nice expressive faces seen throughout all of wave 1. His face is very stoic, and have all sorts of appropriate furrows and wrinkles. His cape is also nicely textured. The one thing I don’t like about Thor is his size. He’s huge. Like, too huge. I know Thor is supposed to be a tall character, but stand him next to Captain America, Iron Man, or anybody really and you’ll see that he’s far too large. I’m not sure what happened there, but he should definitely have been scaled down a bit more.

HOPE: Hope’s sculpt features a lot of reused parts with a few new ones as well. Her arms, hands, torso, upper legs, and feet are the same as several of the female characters Hasbro has done in the recent past, such as Elektra. It’s +a nice sculpt that I think is actually one of the best female body types ever made. Her forearm gauntlets are separate pieces and just slip around the arms. Both her forearm and shin guards has some nice detail sculpted in, with several overlapping sections giving the look that something has been wrapped around them.

Her cape has a lot of wrinkles and tatters sculpted into it, that makes it look very appropriately battle worn. Hope’s face isn’t as expressive as the rest of wave 1, but it’s still a very good sculpt. She’s clearly meant to be an attractive woman, and her red hair that is partially blowing in the wind has a lot of hair strands and details sculpted in. There are some imperfections here and there from the mold, but they’re not really noticeable unless you’re looking up close.

SCULPT SCORE –

THOR: 4 / 5 HOPE: 4 / 5

PAINT – THOR: Hasbro is continuing to surprise me with the level of paint detail applied to these new Marvel Legends. Considering their first offerings back in 2007 featured as few paint details as possible, this is a very nice change. Thor has a great black wash over his leg and arm armor that really helps bring out the scaling.

There is some slop in some areas, but that is to be expected when dealing with paint washes. Other than that, there is really no paint slop anywhere on Thor. All the piping on his suit is very clean, and the shading and highlighting on the figure looks very nice. The only part that’s not painted is his cape. That’s been cast in the appropriate color.

HOPE: There is a really nice looking metallic green paint job on the green parts of her suit. It really helps the figure stand out. There are some rough edges with the yellow lines painted on her suit though. Her arm and leg guards, as well as her cape have some great dry brushing to them. I was surprised at the amount of dry brushing, but it really helps make those parts look worn and helps bring out the sculpt even more. I was sad to see her hair isn’t as detailed. It’s painted red and looks nice, but there’s no shading or highlighting to it.

PAINT SCORE –

THOR: 3.5 / 5 HOPE: 3.5 / 5

ARTICULATION – THOR: He features a really good amount of articulation, however some of that is a bit restricted so it lowers the range of motion of that articulation. He has a ball jointed neck, ball jointed shoulders, bicep swivels, swivel hinge elbows, swivel hinge wrists, mid torso swivel/ab crunch, ball jointed hips, thigh swivels, double jointed knees, and swivel hinge ankles. Thor’s hair restricts the ball jointed neck and it really can only act as a cut joint. I was shocked at how good the mid-torso joint is though. It swivels just fine and even has a good range of motion for an ab crunch or for him to bend his back backwards.

The cape and the skirting of his suit so restrict his shoulders and hips respectively. It’s not too bad, but it might limit your posing options. Thor’s overall bulkiness is also somewhat restrictive by nature, due to how large and bukly he is. Something to watch out for is his knee joints. The actual knees have a very thin layer of plastic connecting them to the double joint. I was surprised to see how thin it was, considering if enough force was applied you could snap his leg off at the knee.

The range of movement on her elbows is restricted too. She could have done with some double elbows here, because her single elbows make it difficult to hold her gun with both hands in some positions. Her mid-torso joint is just a swivel. I really with Hasbro would change this into an actual ab crunch, but I don’t expect that to happen anytime soon. Everything below the waist works fine, and you can get some really good stances out of her.

ARTICULATION SCORE –

THOR: 3.5 / 5 HOPE: 3 / 5

ACCESSORIES – THOR: Thor comes with his hammer and that’s it. Hasbro didn’t give him a Terrax piece, because they didn’t want to make people who already bought him at SDCC buy him again. His hammer is great though. A nice leather wrapped handle, and lots of cracks and other details into the head of the hammer, with some great shading and highlighting. I do with the loop at the end of the handle was big enough to fit around Thor’s hand though, so you could pose him in mid flight. Speaking of, he could have done with a flight stand of some kind, maybe a lightning attachment for the hammer or something. His hammer is important, but he could have come with more accessories.

That loop does come in handy though. I noticed on the strap that hangs from his belt, you can unhook it from the figure and slip Thor’s hammer on there. That is definitely a welcome feature, because most action figures these days feature no place to holster their weapons. Sometimes Thor wants to eat or read, right? So now he can just hook it to his belt.

HOPE: Hope comes with a brand new gun, just for her. It looks awesome too. Several layers in the sculpt, with lots of detail. I’m no fictional gun smith, but this certainly looks like it could be an ouchmaker. It is completely unpainted though. It’s just been cast in the right color, with no paint detailing at all. That’s disappointing too, because it could look a whole lot better with some shading and highlighting. She also comes with the head, and the cosmic axe of Terrax which is great if you’re trying to build Terrax. Otherwise, it’s useless. But it does help fill up that package.

ACCESSORIES SCORE –

THOR: 3 / 54 HOPE: 3.5 / 5

FUN – THOR: Kids are sure to think Thor is fun. He’s big, he just had a movie come out, and he’s going to be in the Avengers, so I can see kids having a lot of fun with this figure. And I would have to agree. Despite the discrepancy in his size, he is fun to mess around with and pose.

HOPE: Not as fun, unfortunately. Hasbro has a tendency to make their female figures less fun for some reason. Perhaps it’s the articulation, or the standard sculpt, or the lack of expression in her face, but Hope isn’t as fun to play with. She is a cool figure, and I really love all her new parts. She’s also pretty integral to any X-Men display, but if she didn’t come with Terrax pieces I could see her being a peg warmer for sure.

FUN SCORE –

THOR: 4 / 5 HOPE: 3 / 5

OVERALL – Thor is a great figure on his own, and while Hope is a great character, she could have done with a better figure. There’s a lot of surprising detail in each figure, both in the sculpts and in the paint job. Hope’s female buck could use an update, particularly with double elbows and a new mid-torso joint that actually works as an ab crunch. Overall though, Hasbro continues to impress with wave 1 of their new Marvel Legends. They could have done with more accessories, but given the constantly rising cost of raw materials, the level of accessories is to be expected for a mass market release. I’ll be reviewing the rest of wave 1 later, so stay tuned!

OVERALL SCORE –

THOR: 4 / 5 HOPE: 3.5 / 5

Where to buy:

Amazon has the wave one figures for sale singly. Click on the names to view their individual listings: Thor, and Hope Summers.